Spartans get narrow win over Iowa
Iowa forward Aaron Fuller attempts to block freshman center Derrick Nix during the Spartans? game against Iowa Wednesday night at Breslin Center. The Spartans won with a final score of 70-63.
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Their work here is done.
The MSU men’s basketball team put a final — though potentially discouraging — stamp on a crucial homestand Wednesday night by beating Iowa 70-63 to improve its record to 6-0 in the Big Ten and hold its lead in the conference standings.
The ball is rolling now for the Spartans to embark on a make-or-break portion of their schedule, which includes trips to some of the most imposing Big Ten venues.
As for Monday night, senior forward Raymar Morgan’s 16 points paced the Green and White, as the No. 6 Spartans (16-3 overall, 6-0 Big Ten) sharply overcame another slow start, then withstood a late Hawkeye surge.
“We’re not where we need to be,” a displeased MSU head coach Tom Izzo said afterward. “We’re 6-0; there are some other teams that have worse problems than we do. Am I looking for perfection? You’re damn right. And I’m not going to stop until we get it.”
Photo: Junior guards Kalin ...
The Spartans trailed for much of the first half until a 3-pointer came from an unlikely source in Draymond Green.
The sophomore forward caught the ball at the top of the key looking to pass, realized he was open and dropped in just his second deep ball of the season to give MSU a 20-19 lead at the 9:24 mark.
In a span of just more than a minute, the Hawkeyes (7-12, 1-5) fell victim to an MSU junior guards highlight reel — a Chris Allen alley-oop dunk, a Kalin Lucas pull-up 3-pointer and a Durrell Summers breakaway layup — as part of a 15-0 run.
In all, it amounted to a 21-4 run to end the half. It also left the Hawkeyes in the rearview mirror for good.
“It’s typical that they were in control,” Iowa head coach Todd Lickliter said. “I’m sure there was a let-up on their part, but to our guys’ credit, they continued to fight. We got in striking range, although you’ve got to hand it to them that when they did, they made a big shot.”
Summers, whose stat line has been mostly unpredictable this year, dropped 12 in the first half while Green tallied nine points and 11 rebounds. Though they shot just 11-for-17 from the free-throw line, the Spartans’ bench outscored Iowa’s 19-3.
“We can do a lot better job,” Morgan said. “We just had times defensively where we weren’t that good and to let Iowa back in the game on that kind of run is inexcusable.”
The Spartans will head to Minnesota on Saturday to begin their toughest leg of the season. Of the next eight games, only two are at home — against preseason top-5 Purdue and Big Ten surprise Northwestern.
“Minnesota gave us everything we wanted at home,” Izzo said of the Spartans’ 60-53 win on Jan. 13. “If we’ve got guys who are crazy enough to be comfortable with that … then we’ll really get a whooping. If we got one of those teams with three or four of your best players are juniors or seniors and you’ve got to get whooped to figure out where you are, then you’ve got problems.”
Commentary
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hermann
(01/21/10 9:55am)Report
Not a good effort.
Jason
(01/21/10 10:09am)Report
The worst part is that for the first time ever, I feel like Izzo got outcoached in the second half. Anyone who was watching the game could see that Iowa was doing the same thing over and over and over. Pick and roll to the midline and go strong to the hoop. I feel like they ran this play 10 times in a row and the only time we stopped it was when they missed, not because we shut down the lane. Height is not our biggest weakness…help D is, particularly within 15 feet of the basket (I do feel out perimeter D and help D have improved dramatically since the Florida loss). This has to improve because a team like Purdue or OSU will eat us up in the post if we continue to allow such easy looks.